6.6 | / 10 |
Users | 0.0 | |
Reviewer | 3.0 | |
Overall | 3.0 |
A young man, visiting the castle of a murderous ancestor accidentally brings his dead relative back to life!
Starring: Joseph Cotten, Elke Sommer, Massimo Girotti, Rada Rassimov, Antonio CantaforaHorror | 100% |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 1.74:1
Original aspect ratio: 1.85:1
English: LPCM 2.0
None
50GB Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Region A (locked)
Movie | 3.0 | |
Video | 3.5 | |
Audio | 3.5 | |
Extras | 2.0 | |
Overall | 3.0 |
Mario Bava's place in cinema history is safely secured. He shot nearly forty Italian features as cinematographer before making his breakthrough solo
directorial debut, the sublime chiller Black Sunday, which bridged the gap between the cobweb-hung romanticism of the 1930s Universal
monster movies and the more violent, psychosexual strain of horror to come. With 1964's Blood and Black Lace, he practically invented the
conventions of the giallo sub-genre of "spaghetti thriller" proto-slasher movies—the garish lighting, the stalker wearing leather gloves, the
Crayola-red viscera—and his very name evokes a particular brand of budget-stretching Italian moviemaking.
That's not to say he didn't churn out more than a few thoroughly mediocre pictures. Baron Blood—or Gli orrori del castello di
Norimberga—is definitely one of them. Made in 1972, when the giallo craze was at its peak, the film is something of a self-conscious throwback to
the crumbling gothicism of Black Sunday, albeit with a more modern setting and plenty of the expected bloodshed. It's not quite a slasher, and
not entirely a foggy chiller in the Hammer Horror mold, sitting instead in some tonal netherworld in-between.
Don't be entirely put off by Baron Blood's exceptionally grimy title sequence, which is covered in heavy specks and what appears to be two separate layers of grain—from the background image and the foreground titles—interposed harshly on top of one another. I promise, it gets better. At least, somewhat better. The film's 1080p/AVC-encoded transfer—taken from an original 35mm negative—is certainly an improvement over prior DVD editions, but this is, has been, and always will be a soft, grubby-looking b-movie from Italy's low-budget horror king. Even in tight closeups, the image is never tightly resolved, with fuzzy textures and distinct lack of truly fine detail. This isn't Kino-Lorber's fault; it's just the inherent quality of the lenses, film stock, and lighting used by Bava and his crew. For the most part, the encode itself seems entirely true to source. There's no grain-erasing noise reduction here, no blatant edge enhancement, and—beyond some fleeting banding during the scene where Eva runs through the fog—no overt compression issues. There's been no restorative digital clean-up either, so you'll definitely spot small scratches and flecks of debris throughout, but this does give the semi-satisfying illusion that you're watching an authentically beat-up print projected live. Color is reproduced well, with no major fluctuations or thinness, and contrast seems accurate, neither too punched up nor noticeably flat.
Like the picture quality, Baron Blood's uncompressed Linear PCM 2.0 track has its share of age and budget-related issues, but nothing unexpected from this kind of gothic b-horror 1970s fare. There's a low but perceptible background hiss that runs through most of the film, a few pops and crackles, and dialogue that—while always comprehensible—can occasionally sound thick and slightly muffled. Also, like most Italian-made movies from the period, the dubbing is fairly obvious much of the time. All that aside, there are no real issues here—no channels cutting out, no weird volume fluctuations, no abrasive peaking. The music by Stelvio Ciprani—who had previously scored Bava's Twitch of the Death Nerve—is unsurprisingly a bit thin, dynamically, but never brittle or harsh. Overall, a listenable, faithful-to-source mix. Do note that while the film is in English, there are no subtitle options on the disc whatsoever for those who might need or want them.
It's not nearly the best film in Italo-horror auteur Mario Bava's body of work—that honor would go to Black Sunday or his early influential gialli— but Baron Blood still has its cult fans, who can get past the film's played-out story and appreciate the director's lira-stretching style. Kino- Lorber's Blu-ray release should slake Bava's bloodthirsty followers, with a new high definition transfer that's a solid upgrade from the DVD, and an informative commentary track by Tim Lucas, author of Mario Bava: All the Colors of the Dark.
AIP Cut | 60th Anniversary
1963
Lisa e il Diavolo / The House of Exorcism
1973
The Mask of Satan / La maschera del demonio | The Mario Bava Collection
1960
Operazione paura
1966
I vampiri
1957
Reazione a catena
1971
La notte che Evelyn uscì dalla tomba
1971
2011
E tu vivrai nel terrore - L'aldilà | Glow in the Dark Cover | Limited Edition to 3000
1981
4K Restoration | La chiesa | Cathedral of Demons
1989
2015
Quella villa accanto al cimitero
1981
Spawn of the Slithis
1978
2018
Uncut
2013
40th Anniversary Edition
1974
Un gatto nel cervello | Glow in the Dark Cover & Mini Portrait of Lucio Fulci Limited Edition to 3000
1990
El espanto surge de la tumba
1973
Alucarda, la hija de las tinieblas
1977
Collector's Edition
1981